


Call of the Abyss

by PunkyNemo (TheVampireCat)



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Angst, Drunk Writing, F/M, Freeform, Reflection, i don't know what this is, salty language
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-21
Updated: 2015-04-07
Packaged: 2018-03-14 09:29:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,877
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3405626
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheVampireCat/pseuds/PunkyNemo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes he wants to fall apart and sometimes he does.</p>
<p>But not now. Because right now, she's beside him and that's enough.</p>
<p>For now, that's enough.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So I had (too much) some wine and I wrote a thing. And it kinda sucks and is pointless. But I thought I would share and probably take it down when I reread it sober and realise how truly awful it is.

There are times they all want to fall apart. And there are times that some of them do.

Hell, there were times he did. So many times. Times when he thought she was gone and he wanted to crawl out of his skin to escape the sting of it. Times when he thought she was dead and he’d have done anything - _any_ goddamn thing - to bring that sting back.

Sometimes it’s easier to fall apart. Comforting to give into that abyss of drowned men and lost souls. Sometimes he wants to dive so far inside it that he’ll never find his way out. Never claw his way to the surface. He’ll suffocate, he’ll choke on it.

And that’s just what he wants.

It’s easy, simple, straightforward. Give into the grief and let it consume him. Live with it, wallow in it, feel it until his muscles cramp from the sobbing and his shoulders ache with every hitching breath. And wait, just _wait_ until your heart shatters. Until it breaks into pieces, pieces which become shards, and shards which become splinters, splinters which become a dust so toxic so that he craves a calming breath of wind that’ll just blow it all away. All the hurt, all the pain, all the regret. But somehow he holds on. Because he has to. Because it’s all he has. That dust, those ashes. He has to keep it, because without it, he has nothing.

Sometimes he wants to fall apart. But now is not one of those times.

She sits with him in the garden behind these high walls. Sits at his side, fingertips reaching out to his in the earth and the soil, only just touching. Sometimes so lightly that he thinks it’s only the idea of her fingers he can feel, only the imagined heat of her flesh between the blades of cool grass.

But it’s enough. For now it’s enough.

She found her way back to them. To him. Against all odds Beth Greene is alive. And she’s here. And that’s enough.

And even if they never finish their conversation and even if he never gets to hold her again and even if he has to let her go and make a life with someone else in this safe zone which ain’t safe at all, it’ll still be enough.

She’s different in small ways. A little quieter, a little more withdrawn. She doesn’t sing as much. She tough, but she’s not mercenary, she’s not ruthless, which, he has to admit, is something they could all learn from.

He thinks the truth is they’re all a bit insane. That’s what this world gives you. Death or madness. Take your pick. If you’re really unlucky you get both.

But he’s not unlucky. And neither is she.

Because they’re here. Sitting in the grass together. Fingers almost touching. And maybe something good can come out of this. Maybe something right.

He wonders how long it will last. Not in the grander scheme of things, not in a universal sense. He doesn't ask himself those kind of questions. Not now, not in this world. You don't wonder how long someone will be in your life. Not any more. No one has the luxury of growing old.

No, he just wonders how long _this_ will last. This unspoken routine they have where their afternoons are shared with only each other. The two of them, sitting here in the fading light, content not to speak, not to even touch really. He wonders if one day she won’t come and find him, if she’ll be called away with another task or errand. And then if the day after that it will happen again and again, until this is all lost and they go back to the lives they always led.

He can’t even begin to guess what those lives were.

He loves her. He wonders if she knows. He loves her like she’s a part of him, his bones or his breath. His shattered heart. He loves her enough to die for her and to live for her. He loves her enough to let her go.

He wonders if she knows. He wonders if anyone does.

So every day he waits. Every day he waits for her not to come. For that door to the garden not to open and for her not to walk outside to him. For her not to plant herself in the grass next to him, just close enough not to touch. For her fingers not to stretch towards his in the grass. And every day she proves him wrong.

And he’s never been so grateful.

And maybe one day he’ll move his hand along the ground, feel the grit and sand under his nails as his fingertips reach for her, as he slides his skin over hers. And maybe she’ll pretend that she doesn’t notice, that’s it’s as natural as breathing for him to grasp her hand in his. Maybe she’ll run her thumb across his palm and lean against him like she once did when they stopped each other from falling apart.

Maybe one day, when they’re both stronger and the call of that abyss not so loud. Maybe one day.

They can be good, they can be sweet. They can put it all away, put it all behind them.

Sometimes he wants to fall apart. Now is not one of those times.

Now is one of those times when he wants to put it all back together. Find that dust and remake it into splinters, craft the splinters into shards and the shards into pieces. Put a great big band aid on it and voila! he’s whole again. Or at least as whole as he’s ever going to be.

One day he’ll let himself think of the future. One day he’ll let himself think of the past.

But for now, _for now_ , this is enough


	2. Deals with Death

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He makes deals, deals with himself and deals with the devil.
> 
> She came back to him. She fucking died and came back to him.
> 
> And that has to count for something.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok this wasn't meant to have a sequel. 
> 
> Things change, shit happens.

He thinks he’s finally accepted that she’s alive. Thinks he’s got it through his thick skull. Thinks he doesn’t need the constant reassurance. That he’s getting past the stage of having to see her physically in front of him to know she’s there.

He’s doing well. Better than he did a few weeks ago, maybe not as good as he’ll do a few weeks from now.

There’s always that moment though. That moment first thing in the morning when he opens his eyes and the panic sets in, and he thinks it’s all been a dream and he remembers how she died right there in front of him. Right there in front of him. She fucking _died_ in front of him. And then he remembers that she didn’t. And for a moment he goes slack in his bed and he doesn’t feel anything at all.

There’s a twisted irony to all this. Some black humour he may once have laughed if it were, you know, humourous.

It’s not. So he doesn’t.

But still there’s some cosmic joke going on here. And it’s on him. And he doesn’t quite get it. Because when he thought she was dead - when he’d tried to accept she was really, really gone - that moment, the one that now exists as pure white-hot panic, the split second he can only describe as after “sleep” but before “awake” was peaceful, a moment of bliss before the reality set in. And now it’s the other way around.

It doesn’t matter.

He’ll pay the price. It’s only small, after all. A moment of panic, a day of her. It’s a trade he makes every morning, a transaction he negotiates every night. It’s better this way. It’s infinitely better.

Still, he’s up early; still, he walks the house, bare feet on creaky floorboards; still, he stands outside her bedroom straining to hear the sound of her breathing.

Still, he can barely believe it when he does.

It’s colder now and they don’t have their afternoons any more. He knew they’d come to an end eventually. Knew there’d be a day she wasn’t there to sit with him in the grass. Fingers almost touching.

_Yes._ _Almost._

It wasn’t because of some duty though, something that interfered with them, something they deemed more important than each other. No, it was much more pragmatic than that.

A light fall of rain, the cold bite of wind, the smallest dusting of snow.

He thinks maybe the elements are against him. Against _them_.

He thinks it’s only right that they should be. They’ve conquered the living dead and the actual dead so really it seems fitting that they’d be foiled by something as mundane as snow. The odd icy gust of wind. And now, well now it’s too complicated to find an alternative. Too official. Too everything.

Their afternoons are still free though. His shifts start early. 6am and he’s outside doing sweeps of the city. He’s done by two, home by 2:30. She teaches kindergarten, she’s also done by two. But so is Maggie and without the garden as an easy escape to them, she watches Beth like a hawk. Consumes her time.

He thinks she’s trying to make up for leaving, for giving up on Beth. He thinks they all are.

So there’s no time and no space and he still can’t sit around making chit chat and he still doesn’t know what this thing is between them. And he still doesn’t know how to spend time with her without actually spending it.

He guesses he’s kind of a wreck. He guesses he’s kind of useless.

 _I know you lost something back there,_ says Rick.

Sometimes he thinks he’s selfish when he wonders if they lost more here.

She seems to feel it too though, sometimes he’ll catch her watching him from across the room, eyes big and stormy, yet impassive, ready to shed tears but also hard as ice. Other times her fingers will brush his as they pass each other, a gentle caress of skin across skin.

It could be an accident. He knows it’s not.

And still, still he does not know how to go to her, doesn't know how to let go of that pull to the darkness. He guesses he’s just afraid to lose her again. Guesses it doesn’t make a difference though. With her or not, losing her doesn’t hurt any less and anyone who tells you different is a liar.

There are times he’s worried she’s forgotten though. Forgotten or just got tired of waiting for him to say something. Like she thinks it should be simple for him. Like she doesn’t know it’s bone shattering and heartbreaking. Like she doesn’t know how hard this is and thinks it should be easy.

And it should be. It _fucking_ should be. And he doesn’t know why it’s not. Except when he does.

He gets that he’s fucking this up but he doesn’t know how to unfuck it.

_I know you lost something back there._

He thinks maybe it was him. Maybe that was the trade. Maybe that’s the actual deal he makes every night with himself, with fate, with a god he doesn’t believe in.

She’s dead and he can love her; or she’s alive and he can’t. It isn’t even a question.

Sometimes he asks himself why. Other times he just stands outside her door waiting to hear her breathe.

They dance around it, they pretend things are back to how they were in the prison. And every day he feels her slipping through his fingers a little more, like fine grains of sand, an hourglass emptying itself out until someone, _someone new_ \- not him you hear, not him at all - turns it back over.

He waits for that day like he waited for their summer afternoons outside to end, for their fingers to stop touching in the long grass. Waits for her to come home with a new Zach, a new Jimmy. Some college boy who mirrors her pretty smile, whose hands are soft, skin uninked.

It doesn’t come. Not yet at least. But in his bones he can feel that it will.

 _I know you lost something back there,_ says Rick, _but you found it again. That’s a one in a million chance Daryl. Ain’t no one here been this lucky. Ain’t no one on Earth been this lucky._

Rick knows. But all the same he doesn’t.

He thinks maybe he’s hard to understand, thinks maybe Beth is harder. Thinks Rick maybe sees them as people or something, a version of him and Lori, of Maggie and Glenn. Doesn’t see them as who they were the weeks after the prison fell, as those wild creatures of the forest. Transcendent. Mythological even. Doesn’t see Beth as she is.

He wonders if this isn’t part of the problem. Maybe he sees her as something she isn't. Something fabled and fanciful, something not quite human.

But then he remembers that she died. She _fucking_ died and still came back to him. If that ain’t fucking transcendent he doesn’t know what is.

_She fucking died and came back to him._

That has to count for something.

He wants to ask if it does. Thinks if they still had the garden, if it hadn’t fallen to the snow, if it wasn’t a gummy mess of mud and autumn leaves that he would. That he might just slide his hand over hers in that summer grass and ask.

He’s always braver in his head.

He’s always braver everywhere than he is here.

So he makes deals, deals with death. He won’t love her if she can just stay alive, he won’t touch her if they can just live here forever, he won’t tell her anything that he feels as long as he can hear her breathing every morning. He makes so many deals.

But when he’s near her he forgets them all.

And then there’s a night. A night he never thought would come. And they’re alone. The rest scattered to whatever social norm they’re trying to make work in a world of no norms.

 _Looks like it’s just us then,_ she says when she gets home and he likes the sound of that.

She makes dinner and they sit at the table to eat. And it’s good, whatever it is that she’s made, something with chicken and canned tomatoes and curried potatoes. Homemade bread on the side. It’s really good, but he finds it hard to concentrate on the food, hard to look anywhere but the line of her shoulder, the red of her lips, the way her eyes reflect the candlelight and her fingers play with the rim of her wine glass.

And he wonders how this suddenly became a date.

They don’t talk, not much really. If he talks she might say “Oh” again. And he might say “You know”. And she might get flustered and he might too. And he might end up chasing a black car with a white cross all night. And she might die. And she might not fucking come back.

These are the deals he makes. The deals with death.

_I know you lost something back there._

But he’s losing something here too.

So they eat slowly. Having food like this is a luxury. Food you can prepare, not found in a can. And he watches her. And in his head he tells her he loves her.

He’s always braver in his head.

And when they’re done she clears the dishes. She bites her lip as she does. He let’s himself wonder if she was hoping for more. He makes a deal with himself not to do that anymore.

Her hair is loose when she turns her back to him. Loose and long. He wonders how it would feel in his fingers. Strong and thick or like those grains of sand he keeps losing. If he could bury his face in it, breathe her in through it. If it’ll be like keeping a part of her with him for that moment of panic in the morning.

Another deal, another promise he can’t keep.

He stands to help her, grabbing a drying up cloth from the rack next to the teacups.

Yes, they have teacups.

She’s already running water and he’s drawn to her shoulder again, the way her oversized white sweater has slipped off it, the small beauty marks on her neck.

_Look away, look away or she’ll disappear again._

He looks away. Looks at the teacups, the draws which hold candles and cutlery and tablecloths, bottle openers and paring knives. Draws that hold the old world. Draws that deny the apocalypse.

_Never you mind that the dead walk. Never you mind._

She hums, he knows the song. He adds the words in his head as she goes.

 _Oh it’s such a perfect day_  
_I’m glad I spent it with you_  
_Oh such a perfect day  
_ _You just keep me hanging on*_

He wonders if it’s a message. If she’s asking him to leave.

In his head he does, just to test it out. In his head he walks out the door. In his head he never sees her again.

He’s always braver in his head.

So he dries as she washes. And he goes slow and so does she. And occasionally he tosses a plate or a knife back into the sudsy water so she can wash it again even though it was perfect the first time. And she smiles behind her hair and he hates that he can’t see it. And when they’re done, well and truly done, she cleans out the sink and he wipes down the already clean counters. And her hips knock into his and her thighs rub against his as she moves. But she doesn’t tell him to leave, to get out of the way, to move his ass out of the fucking kitchen so she can finish up.

So he stands, out of place, like a fool with a damp dish towel in his hands. And he looks at the teacups. And he thinks they’re mocking him.

And he looks around the room, this house where they pretend to be normal, where they pretend the world hasn’t gone to hell in a handbasket. And he looks at the couch and how even the fucking upholstery is perfect and how there’s a Turkish carpet on the floor which isn’t even the slightest bit threadbare and probably worth thousands of dollars in a world that cared about dollars.

And it’s all mocking him.

This place, this world, the deals he makes every night and the sound of her breathing in the morning. The fact that she’s here with him and he can’t go to her and touch her and tell her how he feels.

And then she’s in front of him, in his space and she’s holding out her hand and for a second he thinks she’s offering a handshake and he wonders what this means. If this is them now. From handholds to handshakes in a matter of months.

He knows he’s fucking up. He doesn’t know how to unfuck it.

But then he realises she’s asking for the dish towel and fumbling, he holds it out to her. It’s clammy and damp and disgusting and will end up in the next batch of laundry because they’re normal now, they’re so fucking normal that they do laundry and worry about wearing the same shirt twice on a summer’s day.

And, as she takes it from him, her hand brushes his and he doesn’t think he imagines her fingertips lingering on his knuckles or the way her eyes meet his. And he doesn’t imagine the sound of her breathing or the way her lips part. And then there’s no time for imagining and no time for deals because he’s lowered his mouth to hers and she’s standing on her tip toes to meet him halfway, to rest her hands on his shoulders and touch her lips to his.

It’s a kiss of sorts. It’s not wild or passionate, but it’s a kiss.

And it lingers. It lingers long and hard and full. It lingers in their flesh and bones, in the scent of her hair and the slide of her skin. It’s still a kiss though, a kiss too long to be chaste, too wet to be innocent.

But it’s still a kiss.

And it still breaks every deal he’s ever made. With God. With the devil. With himself.

And he tells himself it doesn’t matter. They weren’t real deals anyway.

And she’s sweet and soft and when he pulls away she smiles and touches his cheek. And for a moment, just a moment he leans into her hand, turning his face to kiss her palm as his blood pounds in his ears and his legs tremble. And when she lowers her arm her sweater falls again. Off her shoulder, halfway down her arm, creamy flesh, scented skin. And he waits for her to cover up. Cover herself like she did that night when Zach died.

But she doesn’t.

She leaves it, waits for him to move. And he almost does. He almost lays his hand on her, he almost presses his lips to her skin.

 _Almost_.

He’s always braver in his head.

Instead he tells her he needs to get to bed and she smiles, giggles even, although he can’t be sure. And they’re all business, the type of ridiculous efficiency that only comes with the most crimson embarrassment.

He thanks her for the meal. She nods and thanks him for the help cleaning up. And they’re giving each other the widest of berths and yet somehow the room is still too small, and they’re bumping into each other and out of themselves. And eventually he just turns to make his way up the stairs, to leave, to get away from the buzzing in his head and the crackling tension in his bones.

But when he gets to the top step he hears her call his name and he can’t help but look at her, small and slight and luminous. And he can’t help but think that he’s right and Rick’s wrong. And she _is_ something otherworldly and transcendent.

She fucking died. And yet she came back for him.

That has to mean something.

It _has_ to.

 _I won’t leave you,_ she whispers, _I won’t._

And he nods because he doesn’t know what else to do, what else to say or who else to be.

_I won’t leave you._

And she doesn’t. Because she is not a liar. And she keeps her word.

And he sleeps fitfully that night because he’s broken his. Or maybe because he’s kept it. But the panic isn’t there when he wakes up in the morning and somehow that makes him panic all the more. So he gets out of bed and pads down the hall to her room, laying a hand against her door, feeling the grain of the wood against his palm, wondering what lingers on the other side.

_I know you lost something back there_

He touches his fingers to his lips and hears her breathing, even and deep and so very much alive. And he wants to go inside, slide under sheets which smell of rosemary and sage and her, draw her into his arms and hold her close.

Maybe he’ll kiss her again, maybe he won’t.

But he’ll be there, with her, in an honest to God, real bed. And there’ll be no panic and there’ll be no fear.

But he doesn’t.

He’s always braver in his head.

_I know you lost something back there._

Yeah but maybe he found it back here. Maybe it found him.

And she’s alive and she’s beautiful. And he kissed her and she didn’t disappear.

And she didn’t die. Even when she did, even when she fucking died in front of him, she still came back to him. And that has to mean something.

It _has_ to.

And the panic is gone. And his heart is pounding. And his throat is dry. But his head is clear. And the world is bright. And he doesn’t feel that pull to the darkness. And maybe he knows how to unfuck this. Or at least how to start.

And for a while he stops making deals.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *** Lou Reed, Perfect Day**


	3. Maybe this time

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Ugh, I don’t know, there wasn’t meant to be a part two even and now there is a part three. I started trying to write _Burn_ and I got this instead. **

Sometimes he wonders what it would be like to kiss her. Kiss her properly, long and hard. Not that fleeting brushing of lips in the kitchen while he pretended to be interested in the teacups. He wonders what her mouth would taste like under his and if she’d let him press his lips to her skin, let his tongue roam her shoulders, her neck. He wonders if she’d pull him closer, move her body to his mouth. He wonders if she’d shake under his hands and if her skin would prickle. Or maybe she’d push him away for daring - _daring_ \- to be so forward.  


But maybe she wouldn’t.  


And that’s what kills him. That tiny hope that she wouldn’t and that he’d feel her fingers on his face, in his hair, maybe running over his shoulders and down his arms. Maybe he could put his lips on her belly, taste the salt of her skin and maybe she’d wind her legs around his waist. 

That’s a lot of maybes. He doesn’t think there’s enough room in the world for all of them. Doesn’t think he can run the full gauntlet of maybes when it comes to Beth. So he doesn’t try.

But that doesn’t mean he doesn’t wonder. Doesn’t mean he doesn’t imagine. Doesn’t mean he doesn’t go crazy with it.

He’s stopped making deals with himself. So that’s good. He kissed her however briefly, touched her shoulder and she didn’t disappear. So maybe those gods who keep a tally of checks and balances haven’t been alerted to him yet. Haven’t seen he’s in the red and started calling in the debt. Maybe he’s not there yet, not overdrawn and Holy Mother of God, Daryl Dixon knows about being overdrawn. Maybe he’s just in overdraft or maybe, just maybe he had more in the bank than he thought he did.

The bank of Beth. Yeah, he thinks he’s going a little crazy. This isn’t how normal people approach these situations. They don’t sit around wondering if they’ve paid enough to greedy gods, if they’ve sacrificed enough. They don’t stand outside doors like stalkers at night listening for the sound of breathing. They don’t forget how to talk to people they’ve spoken to a million times before. This isn’t normal. And no it’s not the world and the fact that it’s probably never been more fucked up in the millions upon millions of years it’s existed. It’s not that. It’s him. 

He’s not really sure what to do with any of it. And he knows she sees it. Sees something in his eyes. And he sees something in hers and he knows part of it is longing and another part is disappointment. And that’s when he allows the maybes to take over. And that’s when he imagines his lips and her hands and the little sounds she might make if he’s is even capable of getting her to make them.

And then he goes out of his head and out of the house and disappears for a few hours until he thinks he can try again.

Try for what he doesn’t know. Try to talk, try to breathe, try to be? It’s all a mess now anyway.

He frustrates her, he knows he does. He frustrates himself too. But that’s because he has no idea what to do with any of this. From that kiss in the kitchen, to listening to her breathing in the bedroom, to this constant semi-arousal he’s learning to live with.

But he sees how she watches him. Sees the look in her eyes. He thinks it’s a kind of weariness, a longing, but he can’t be sure. He can’t be sure about anything anymore. He’s never been good with words. And Beth, well Beth is all about the words. She’s all about telling him off, expressing herself. Making sure everyone knows exactly what’s going on and what she’s thinking.

But still, he doesn’t know. He doesn’t know how to speak to her. It’s not like before. Before when it was just them and they were alone and he was coming to realise she would be the only person in the world he’d ever see again and he was okay with that. Happy about it even. It's not like that.

Because she died.

She _died_.

And then she came back to him.

And forgive him if he doesn’t really know what to do with that. If after countless tears and branding himself with cigarettes, he still doesn’t know what to do with that. 

_Forgive him._

But forgiveness isn’t a thing. Not in this world. Because he let her get taken. And then he let her die. Don’t matter that she came back, that she’s here. Doesn't matter at all. Because he let it happen. She’s here by fluke, by luck, by the universe having some kind of glitch which allowed her to survive a shot to the brain. A glitch that let her come back from the dead.

Maybe that ain’t such a glitch. Considering the state of the world at present, it might well be more normal than it should be.

Either way, it’s on him. It’s all on him. And even though he’d fucking die for her. Even though he’d throw himself off a cliff just because she asked, he just doesn’t think he’s capable of doing this all again. 

_A black car with a white cross.  
_

_I tried. I tried._

And he failed. He failed then and he failed again later. And it’s nothing short of a fucking miracle that she is back here. And it has nothing to do with him and everything to do with her. And even though she didn’t disappear when he touched her, when he kissed her, he still doesn’t deserve her.

Maybe she can forgive him. She's never said anything and part of him suspects it's because in that pretty head of hers she doesn't think there's anything to forgive.

It doesn't matter. He can't forgive himself. That's the rub.

He lost her twice. There ain’t no forgiving that.

So he spends as much time out as he can. He takes double shifts and he’s grateful that there’s cold wind and sometimes snow and that they don’t have afternoons any longer. He misses how their fingers almost touched, misses how he could smell her hair and the sun on her skin. But they can’t have that now and it’s okay. 

She’s alive, so everything is okay. He won’t ask for more.

At least not out loud.

In his head maybe. In his heart too. His soul if he has one.

Yeah that’s a lot of maybes. And yeah, he’s come full circle.

There’s a boy too. He calls him a boy even though he knows full well he’s a man. But Daryl’s older than dirt in years and older than that in spirit, so everyone’s young to him lately. He’s not sure what his name is, but he’s seen him walking with Beth, seen him laugh a little too hard, a little too long at her jokes. Seen the indulgent smiles she gives him, the slight exasperation in her eyes. 

And it feels like a quick hard punch to the gut, the kind his old man would give him when he least expected it. Normal people might say he’s jealous but it doesn’t feel that way. It feels like something else. Something that crushes his bones and wrings the blood out of him. Something that leaves him short of breath and too big for his own skin.

But this boy isn’t so bad. Maybe he’s a bit like Zach. Someone who Beth can talk to, someone who can give her a taste of the life that once was. Someone who can ease her out of her teenage years softly and properly. Not someone who’ll throw her into the life of 30-something hillbilly who can’t forgive himself and thinks he’s in the red when it comes to cosmic favours.

Still, he knows there’ll be a day when this boy will take on a larger role in her life. And that’ll just be it.

The end of it.

The end of something that never began.

It happens sooner than he thinks.

He gets home late. Took three shifts doing sweeps of the city. Has another starting at seven the next morning. It keeps him out of the house. It keeps him away from her. And that’s okay too. As long as he has that moment in the evening and the morning to feel the rough grain of wood against his hand and listen to her breathe. He guesses he just wants to know she’s there.

But tonight she’s not there. Because tonight as he comes walking down the street in the dark, boots scuffing against the tar he sees she’s sitting on the porch, wrapped up in dark jacket and a woollen scarf. Steam rises off the mug she’s clasping and he can smell coffee and wonders what she’s doing outside so late. 

But he doesn’t really.

She’s waiting, and he knows she’s waiting for him. It’s not something he has any reason to believe but he knows it’s true. Knows those endless frustrated looks, the wariness in her eyes had to come to this eventually. Beth Greene doesn’t leave things alone for long. She rides them out, waits a little, weighs everything up. And then she makes a move. And it’s calculated and thoughtful. And it’s always something that cuts hard and deep and to the quick of the problem.

And he can’t turn around and walk away now. And even if he did he doesn’t think she’d give up that easily. Beth Greene was never one to have her plans thwarted by a blustery redneck with more issues than years.

So he walks to the steps, stands in front of her and says _hey_. _Hey_ as if this is just what they do. As if this is just normal and he says _hey_ to her everyday. Like he doesn’t listen to her breathe and like he didn’t kiss her in the kitchen and drown in her eyes when he did. He says _hey_ to her like she’s just someone you say _hey_ to.

And she answers. And her _hey_ is equally nonchalant, equally dishonest. And he wonders how they came to this. How there was a moment in this world where there was nothing in their way and he opened up to her and poured himself into her. And now, now there’s just this.

Rick once told him he lost something back there. Back at Grady, back in Atlanta. He’s lost more here though. Looking at her now he knows he has. And he wishes he wasn’t so awkward and he wishes he wasn’t so unsure. And he wishes the fact that he is meant something to her. That she doesn’t just bypass it all. Because that’s what she does. She bypasses it. She says it doesn’t matter that he’s an asshole redneck, that he was a nobody and he doubts her opinion of his worth would change if she knew his dad took a belt to him and beat the living shit out of him over and over again. She’ll think he’s important all the same. She’ll still think he’s worthy and deserving. She’ll still say his past doesn’t matter. 

And for a girl who’s right about so many things, he wonders how she can be so wrong.

And maybe that’s what he lost. That clean slate she gave him. Maybe that’s all it really was.

But he lost it.

And now it’s gone.

She asks him to sit with her and he does, scrunches himself onto the steps, so that his thigh lies against hers and he imagines he can feel her skin through her jeans, through his. And he can smell her hair and the faint scent of strawberries and a richer one of her coffee. And somehow things don’t seem so bad and so scary when they’re like this. He can tell himself they’re just people and they’re just sitting. They have a history, they have a present and he doesn’t need to worry about anything else because they _should_ be here together. They _should_ have things to talk about. And the fact that she’s leaning against him, head almost on his shoulder and that she’s breathing deeply and he thinks she’s doing it because she wants to smell the smoke and leather of him, seems all right. 

It’s quiet out, quiet except for the faint hum of the streetlights with their strange halogen glow. Sometimes if he looks hard enough he can see rings of rainbow in the cold and wonders at the strange ethereal light that makes the world look slightly fantastical. Slightly tilted.

Other times it just makes everything look ugly. Uglier inside than outside and, in this world, that’s saying something.

But not tonight. Tonight it’s beautiful. Tonight it’s all fairylights and heavy mist and starlight. Snow and twinkling diamonds and pixie dust.

And her. Her leaning against him, solid at his side, hair tickling his jaw.

And maybe that’s what makes it magical.

So, for a while they sit in silence, in the cold as she sips slowly, deliberately, not looking at him until he starts to wonder if she’s forgotten he’s there. And maybe that would be the best. After all, he’s given her every reason to think he’s forgotten everything. Maybe they need to put this thing to bed, get it all out so they can move on. He’s shit at lying but he thinks maybe he could convince her that the things he said at the funeral home were nothing but words. Just words that blow away in the breeze. And then maybe all this can stop. Maybe he can start working normal hours and not feel like his skin is too small when she’s near him. Explaining away the kiss in the kitchen may be harder. But he thinks there are ways. It was her and candlelight, good food and even some wine. They were alone and it was another magical night just like this one and maybe he got carried away. Maybe he just wanted to be sure she was there and real and maybe he wasn’t thinking. And maybe they shouldn’t make a big deal out of it.

That’s a lot of maybes.

And maybe she’s forgotten. Because it seems like he has.

But he doesn’t want this moment to end. Not yet at least. She was the only person he saw for months. She was by his side daily. His constant in this world gone to shit and her presence was everything to him. And he wants to hold onto that. If only for a while.

But she doesn’t let him.

 _Luke asked me out_ , she says suddenly and it take a moment to parse that sentence. He wants to ask who Luke is and then he remembers it’s that boy who’s really a man. The one with the quick smile and the high cheekbones. The rest of the sentence takes a little more untangling. Asked? Well asked means asked, doesn’t mean she said yes. Out? Well that could mean anything. Asked her out the house, to the store, to the park. There is that nice park down the street. People go out all the time. 

He went out with Maggie the other day when she needed an extra pair of hands to carry a new table. He went out with Rick too when they needed to check fences outside the walls. Going “out” doesn’t have to mean anything. Not in any sense other than just being out and in the same general area with someone who you know.

Except he knows this isn’t what she means. It has that official ring to it. He knows it doesn’t just mean being in the same place at the same time. He knows it means something more. And his mind circles it, even though he knows exactly what it is.

He thinks he might throw up.

Instead, he lights up a cigarette to give himself something to do. Inhales. Waits for the sting, the burn, collapses in it for a second and then let’s it go.  


It does nothing. Nothing but make the bad taste in his mouth worse.

He knew this was coming. He fucking knew it. He knew someone would get the jump on him while he’s still fumbling around trying not to go out of his head when she’s near. He just didn’t think it would come so soon. 

But he also gets his definition of “soon” is probably quite different to Beth’s. To pretty much everyone else. She’s been back for months now. And frankly those months are closer to a year when he thinks about it. And so far they’ve sat barely touching in the garden and he’s pressed the most awkward kiss in the world to her lips.

But this? This is nasty. This is probably nastier than how he felt in the kitchen when he kissed her. He doesn’t think he can hide it.

 _Says he likes me,_ she continues, _says he thinks I like him too._

_Yeah but would you die and come back to him? Would you take a bullet to the brain, lie dying in the trunk of a car and then mend yourself just so you can come back to him?_

He thinks his thoughts don’t make a lot of sense.

Maybe when Rick said he lost something back there, he actually meant his mind, because God knows it hasn’t been right in a long time.

 _Do you?_ he manages to choke out and she shrugs. It’s nonchalant, like she doesn’t know if she does and doesn’t care to figure it out either. Like it’s irrelevant. Maybe it is.

That’s a really big maybe.

 _He’s nice,_ she says, but that doesn’t seem to be something she really cares about one way or another. _Maggie says I should start doin’ normal things again. She thinks it’s a good idea._

And he wants to ask why she’s telling him this. Why the hell does he need to know this shit? She wants to date a boy and it ain’t got nothing to do with him and why should it?

And why does she feel so good and warm pressed against him? And why does he want to put his arm around her and draw her close? And why does it feel like he’s lost the ability to do that? Why does it feel like she’s further away than she’s ever been? And why why why?

And yeah he hates it. And yeah, he feels like he might start puking and crying and falling apart all at the same time and yeah it feels like cigarette smoke is the only thing holding him together and yeah, suddenly this magical night of moonlight and falling snow is uglier than the rotting corpses he sees every goddamned day. And his gut is clenched and there’s a really good chance he might trip if he tries to stand up but he still doesn’t know why the fuck she’s telling him this.

Why the fuck she waited outside in the fucking icy air in the snow, way past midnight to make him sit down so she could rip his heart out of his chest and stamp on it, smile prettily and walk off.

And then what? Just what? What’s he supposed to do afterwards? Go inside, have something to drink, make his way to the shower, where he sobs in the water like some pussy before going to sleep. No, that’s not quite right. Because he’d stand outside her room first, listen to her breathe and then go to sleep with his heart spattered all over his insides.

_Maggie says I should just try and see if I like him._

And somehow he manages between cigarette smoke and broken hearts to ask her what she thinks. And he tries to keep his voice gruff and disinterested but it comes out sharp and pleading and he doesn’t miss the way her eyes flick to his mouth and how she bites her lip hard, sharp white teeth pressed against the meat of it.  And it nearly kills him that he almost knows how she tastes, almost knows how she feels in his arms. It nearly kills him that this is all slipping through his fingers and he doesn’t even have the wherewithal to scramble for it.

And he still wants to puke. And the cigarette is doing nothing to stop his hands from shaking.

 _I... I just don’t wanna make the wrong choice you know?_ she says. _We ain’t got much time here and I don’t wanna waste what I have._

And yeah, even he ain’t dumb enough to miss that one. Even he gets what she’s trying to say. And he wonders how far into the red he is now. How much he owes just because he’s sitting here talking to her and letting himself hear what she’s saying.

So maybe he does still make deals with himself.

Maybe.

Sometimes.

_I just don’t wanna be alone forever, you know. But I also don’t wanna be with someone just because I don’t wanna be alone. It ain’t fair on him, because what if there’s someone else out there for him. Someone who really does know and really does want him and they’d kind of fit together like a puzzle or somethin’. And perhaps there’s a person like that for me too. And I don’t wanna waste my time with someone else then because maybe it would push him further away and I really don’t wanna do that if there’s a chance you know? Even a small chance._

It comes out as a rush. Words quick and tripping over each other, none of the earlier calm disinterest. It’s just there. Falling out of her like she’d been keeping it bottled up inside and the top just blew.

And her eyes flicker briefly to his lips again and then down to her coffee mug, clasped between her hands.

Oddly this takes less time to parse. All the words and their jumbled delivery fit nicely into a little slot in his head. A little slot he allows himself to have where he can pretend he doesn’t have a series of checks and balances in place. A little place just for him. And sometimes for her.

And that’s where her words go. And that’s where they make sense. 

And he turns his head to look at her, cigarette hanging off his lip.

He thinks he says her name. It’s not easy to say anymore because it sticks on his tongue, because he’s worried that when he says it he’s actually confessing how much a part of him she is and that anyone who hears will be able to tell. That they’ll know when he says _Beth_ that he really means “that girl, that beautiful fucking girl who has my heart, my whole heart, that girl that makes me fucking nuts and I wouldn’t change it for the world”. Even so,  he thinks he says it and her eyes widen, bloodshot and watery and he wonders when she started crying, if she’s even has yet.

And between the tears he sees something. Something else. He wants to think it’s a reflection. Want to believe that he’s seeing his own feelings pushed back at him.

Yeah, he lost something back there. He lost his own mind. He lost everything. Every goddamned thing. But now it’s like he’s finding it again. Like he’s dug it out of some long-forgotten grave and it’s still alive and still okay and he can still make it work, even when he thought he can’t.

And then she’s off the steps, pulling away fast and hard as if she can’t stand to touch him anymore and he hates the feel of the open cold where she once was. Her mug smashes on the ground, porcelain shattering loudly and he hears a dog bark somewhere.

 _I’m sorry,_ she’s saying. _I’m sorry._

And then she’s gone, running off down the street, long legs eating up the road as she disappears into the night.

And for once he doesn’t think, doesn’t worry about paying back or paying forward, doesn’t worry about the wins and the losses, the checks and the balances. He just runs, runs after her, down the road, past that barking dog. She’s fast but so is he and when he calls her name and it doesn’t stick in his throat, she falters. 

_Beth_ , he says _Beth Beth Beth._

And he doesn’t care that he can actually hear words like _I love you_ and _stay_ and _please_ , he doesn’t care if those are the words he’s actually saying. Because he did lose something back there. Something that made him want to die, throw himself into that abyss where he’s tortured himself for months. But he’s found it again. And it doesn’t matter how. He’s found it. And he’s damned if he’s about to let it slip away from him.

He catches her at the end of the street, under a street lamp, halogen light turning everything yellow and frayed, his hand at her wrist as he pulls her to look at him, twists her around so that he can see her. See her as her breath mixes white with the air and the stars shimmer in her eyes.

 _Beth_.

 _I’m sorry, I’m sorry,_ she’s saying.

And he wants to say _Sorry for what?_

Sorry for tearing my heart out right out of my chest and curling up in its place? Sorry for shattering me into a billion pieces and putting them all back together again? Sorry for making me weak and then making me strong?

_Don’t be sorry girl, don’t be sorry. Don’t you ever fucking be sorry._

And he’s saying these words to her. He’s actually saying them. More words than he’s said to her in weeks.

In months.

More words than he’s said to her since he said _you know_ and she said _oh_.

_Don’t you ever be sorry. Don’t you dare._

And his hands are closing around both her wrists, clamping down so that he can feel her pulse, beating like a little bird, against his fingers and he’s wrenching her into the seedy light so he can see her eyes and the tears shimmering in them.

_I just thought, I thought just maybe…_

And it’s okay because he thought too. He thought _just maybe_ too.

She’s shaking and it’s not from the cold. And for the first time she won’t look him in the eye. And that’s not Beth. Because Beth looks you and everyone else straight in the eye. She meets the world head on and flips it off when it gets too close. 

But not now. Now her hair is in the way and she’s half fighting him and she looks like a deer caught in a snare. But she doesn’t know that she’s the snare and he’s the one that’s caught.

 _I’m sorry,_ she’s still saying. _I didn’t mean…_

But he did _mean_. That’s the thing, and he wanted her to _mean_ too.

And she’s asking him to just forget it, let it go. And he’s asking her what he should forget and what he should let go. Because he doesn’t want to forget any of it. Not one second he’s spent with her since they rolled up to her farm one hot August afternoon. Because he can’t let go of that. It’s the only thing keeping him sane. He’s lost so many things. So very many things and he can’t lose this too, whatever it is that she’s asking him to.

 _It doesn’t matter,_ she whispers. _It doesn’t matter._

 _It does matter,_ he tells her. _It does._

_It does._

And that’s when she goes quiet, when she stops fighting him. Like a switch flipped in the world and all that reckless over emotional energy was just sucked right out of it. 

And the night is quiet again and when she looks up at him, he can see some of that magic returning.

 _It does matter,_ he says again, voice thick and dry. Rough in this throat.

And she gets his meaning, he knows she does. She frowns slightly, as if she’s not quite sure and why should she be? 

She’s lost things too. Maybe she thought one of them was him. Maybe she has her own checks and balances and thought that this would send her into the red too. Maybe she just didn’t think she could.

And maybe that’s a lot of maybes.

So he does what she’d do, what she’s done when he’s been falling apart. What she’s shown him to do. He pulls her roughly against him, one arm tight at her waist, the other sliding to cup the back of her head to his chest, fingers scrunching in her hair.

_Don’t you dare be sorry girl, don’t you dare._

She resists. For a fraction of a second that's the longest fraction of a second of his life, she's stiff and unyielding and he thinks he’s going to have to let her go. And that would be the worst thing that could happen. Because there’d be no coming back from that. Not for either of them. 

And there’s a heart-stopping moment when he believes that is happening. And he’s already wondering what deals he’s going to have to make to atone for this.

And then she softens, and he wants to say it’s like a godsend, but that’s not quite right because it _is_ a godsend, she _is_ a godsend and has been since the day they ran out of the prison and into each other. Since the day she died and came back to him. He knows it wasn’t for him. He’s not that full of himself to believe that. But it feels like that. It feels like she did even though it makes no sense. So he closes his eyes and lets himself believe it.

She fucking died and she came back to him.

And yet, it feels like the real miracle is her arms creeping around his waist and her cold breath against his breastbone, her heart beating fast and hard against his. The real miracle is that he can smell her hair and the scent of her skin and trace the line of her jaw with his fingertips.

_Christ girl._

He doesn’t think he says it but he must have because somehow she edges closer into him, hunching her shoulders, tucking her head under his chin and rubbing her cheek against his chest like she wants to climb inside him. And he’d let her. He’s already letting her carve open his heart and whittle out a place just for her. A perfect Beth-sized hole that nothing else could ever fill. He doesn’t know why he ever fought it, why he ever thought he could win. Especially when by his very definition of winning he was losing.

Losing hard.

He doesn’t want to lose anymore. He doesn’t want to because he knows if he tallies that he’s had more losses than wins. More bad than good. 

_Beth_ , he whispers.

And she huddles closer to his chest, arms tight around him and again he’s surprised by her strength, the rigid sinew and muscle in her limbs. And he wonders if she knows, if she knows what she is to him. If she knows how much she means and will always mean to him.

Snow is falling when he opens his eyes, just a dusting of the stuff, light and whimsical. And it turns the stark glow from the street lamp into something warmer. Maybe this night can be beautiful after all. Maybe the magic isn’t all lost.

 _Beth look_ , he says. _Look_.

And she does, arms still fixed around his middle, body still pressed so close to his, and even though she’s trembling, he can feel the warmth of her through their layers. And he wants to drown in it.

He touches her cheeks, wipes at her tears with his thumbs. And she’s smooth and silky and everything he knew she would be. And then he pulls her back to his chest, kisses her hair and vows to stand there for as long as she needs.

_Don’t you dare be sorry girl._

_Don’t you dare._

~

Later when they’ve walked back to the house, her hand warm and firm in his, they drink a shot of vodka in the kitchen. And then another. And her fingers stay twined in his and her eyes are still bloodshot with tears but she’s smiling and so is he. And it feels so rare to do this, To be with her and be near her and not be freaking out and not be frightened.

And it’s not that anything is different. Not really. There’s still those checks and balances and there’s still that gauntlet of maybes and there’s still the chance that even though she died, she fucking died and came back to him, it could happen all over again.

And he still lost something back there.

But somehow in the snow and the heat and in that magical fairyland of seedy halogen light and ugly streets and smashed mugs he found permission to do this. He found that space in his heart and in his head, that space where she fits perfectly, is bigger and scarier and more wonderful than he thought.

And that’s why when she says she should get some sleep he’s okay with asking her not to “go out” with Luke. And he’s okay with telling her that he thinks she’s right and they shouldn’t waste the time they have. And he’s okay with letting her kiss his lips ever so lightly and softly and finally, he’s okay with letting go of her hand so she can go upstairs.

And for once he’s sure she’ll be there tomorrow.

Even so, after he’s rinsed the glasses and locked the door to the garden and he’s made his way upstairs, he still stops outside her room. And he still puts his hand to the wood and leans into it just to hear her breathe.

And briefly he can’t. He can’t hear anything at all, not even the creaky silence of the old house. 

And then he feels more than hears her hand on the other side of the wood, almost against his and he imagines her heat coming off it and running through his veins and curling up deep inside him in that little Beth-shaped hole. And he closes his eyes to breathe it in, to breathe her in.

And maybe that’s okay and maybe she can stay there. And maybe he can just fucking relax for once and be happy.

And maybe that’s a lot of maybes.

But maybe it’s not too many.


End file.
